Happy 1st Birthday Nuggets!

 Today is a special day! Today is William and Luke's 1st birthday!  This year has gone by so fast and I cannot believe they are already one!  I have been babysitting these sweet boys since they came home from the hospital.  They decided to enter the world a little early, so I met them while they were still in the hospital.

 

 My babysitting duties began when William came home from the Hospital.  Luke joined us a few weeks later and I had the blessing of watching these two grow so much this year.

 

Yesterday, we celebrated with a Breakfast Taco birthday party! 

The party was a success and the boys had a great time! I cannot believe they are already 1 and I can't wait for summer break when I get to spend more time with them!

Happy Birthday William and Luke!

My New Addictions

So I have found a new love for reading! I have NEVER been a big reader, even though I am a reading teacher.  In the past 3 weeks, I have managed to read 2 books and that is HUGE for me! I loved both of them and couldn't put either of them down.  I spent multiple days just reading and reading!

Book 1 - The Hunger Games

I had heard nothing but great things about this book from my friends and from my students.  I finally got around to reading it and I LOVED every second of it! I cant wait to read the 2nd and 3rd one.  I love that this book can be enjoyed by boys, girls, young teens, and adults.  It is definitely addicting!

Book 2 - Divergent

Oh man! This book was amazing and I almost think I liked it better than The Hunger Games. It was a great mix of adventure and romance! I literally read this in 3 days or so.  I could not put it down! It had many unexpected moments, never would have guessed the ending!  I could read it over and over again! 

I HIGHLY suggest both of these books!  Can't wait to see what I read next!

Happy Easter

Thanks to no snow days this year, we were lucky enough to have a 4 day weekend.  We had Good Friday and Great Monday off this year, so I had plenty of time to go out of town as well as get some great relaxation time at home.  Thursday, we left for Chris' ranch in Watervalley, Tx.

We stopped on our way at Perini Ranch Steakhouse and it was AMAZING! 

After our delicious meal, we finally made it out to the ranch.  We enjoyed some great weather, great food and a great get-a-way!

Austin and I drove back Saturday afternoon and enjoyed a great Easter Sunday with his family.  We luckily finished our Easter Egg Hunt before the rain came.

 And a little time playing in the mud! :)

Great Easter holiday! Sad its over, but thankful we only have 37 more days of school until summer break!

One of the Perks of Being a Teacher...

Spring Break is one of my favorite parts of being a teacher.  At the beginning of the break, Jeni, Kristen, Emily and I went to La Cantera, a resort in San Antonio.  It was the perfect little get a way!

On our drive, we made a quick lunch stop in Austin and ate at the food trucks.  Jeni and I chose the Short Bus, which had the perfect options for teachers.

Once we arrived, we had a little wine tasting and lounging outside by the pool.

That night, we ate Kristen's favorite pizza place called Fralo's.  It was a hole in the wall, sit outside restaurant with some of the best pizza I've ever had!

The next day was filled with plenty of sun time by the pool.  From breakfast until dinner, we lounged, read books and magazines, and sang songs! Great day!

For our last night, we ventured to the Riverwalk and ate at Paesano's.  It was delicious.  We also visited the Alamo... my first time that I can remember! 

Great trip with great friends! I loved every minute of it and can't wait to do this again soon!

Fox Creek Ranch

So this post is LONG overdue! A few weeks ago, my sweet friends from Memphis came in for a weekend trip to the ranch.  I talked about going there a lot in college and I was so excited I finally got the chance to take them!

Here are a few of my favorite pictures of the weekend! You can see some others on Brooke's Blog.

Valentines and Birthdays

February is a big month for me and Austin.  We have Valentines Day and Austins birthday within a week of each other.

For Valentines, we started the tradition of making heart shaped red pancakes for dinner. Growing up, my mom would make those for us Valentines morning.  When I went to college, I brought the tradition there and now Austin and I have taken it on as our own. Its easy and something different.  We typically don't do gifts, but this year I decided to make Austin a little something.  Yes, I found it on Pinterest, but I just couldn't resist.

First task was to come up with my 52 reasons why I love Austin. Of coarse I have many reasons why I love him, so I just began making a list of reasons as I came up with them.  Once I came up with my 52, I typed them on Word and printed them on Address labels. Next task was to punch holes into all 52 cards.

 Once I punched all the holes, I stuck the 52 reasons on each card.

 I bought some scrapbook paper and printed out the title.  I glued this on the front.

 And this on the back.... so we could remember the date.

 Here are a couple pages of the book.

 Here is the final wrapped product! I think it was a hit... perfect gift for him!

 Finally, it was Austin's birthday! We had a big family dinner/celebration on his actual birthday, but we celebrated together with a Saturday Birthday Extravaganza.  I went to pick him up at noon and headed to Fuel City Tacos.  When we have been taking road trips, we started coming up with a list of things we want to do.  This place has been on our list for a long time.

 We then headed downtown to the JFK museum.  We felt like such tourists, but it was something we hadn't done in forever and it is a big thing to do in Dallas!

 Finally, we decided to drive around downtown and Deep Elem and came across The Farmers Market.  Austin had never been, but we used to go all the time when we were little.  We tried a bunch of different foods and purchased some delicious tamales.

All in all, our celebrations were a blast! I love holidays and birthdays! Can't wait for the next celebration!

Homemade Sushi

So about a year ago, Austin and I went to a Central Market Sushi class.  We learned how to make many different kinds of sushi.  It was a blast!

We hadn't tried to make it on our own until a week ago.  For Christmas, my sister got Austin a sushi set, with chopsticks, sushi press, etc.  We planned a double date at their house and all cooked sushi together!

It was so much fun!  We all made at least one roll each and were very creative about what we put in each....made our own recipes! It was a lot easier than I had thought and can't wait to do it again soon.